


needless

by blueincandescence



Series: all's fair in love and cold war [4]
Category: The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (2015)
Genre: F/M, Jealous Illya, Prompt Fill, gaby: no one asked you to, illya: i took a bullet for you, pissed off gaby, the usual
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-20
Updated: 2016-10-20
Packaged: 2018-08-23 15:57:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,214
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8333614
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blueincandescence/pseuds/blueincandescence
Summary: Gaby takes exception to Illya taking a bullet from her mark.





	

CADIZ, 21 MARCH 1964

For every millimeter the gun rises clarity turns up in Gaby like a dial. Heart pumping oxygen and situational awareness straight to her brain, she notes:

First, always, the overshadow to her back and left stepping closer, drawing a second pistol to aim at the nape of her neck. Exactly there; she is learning his obsessions. Illya branded a kiss in the spot below her swept-up hair before hauling her, tearful and thrashing, by the scruff to his employer.

Second, more importantly, Alejandro’s trembling finger avoiding coming to rest on the trigger, the sweat and tears gleaming in the mustache above his gnashing teeth. His anxious boots trample the grass beneath him to dirt but not one petal of his prized red carnations has fallen.

Calm chases clarity.

Gaby meets the wild eyes of her mark and finds no conception that his beloved Flora is the director-star of his soap opera betrayal. He will blame his business partner. He will approach the Interpol agent who has made himself so obvious in his Italian suits. He will give UNCLE everything. He will not — and this is the part of the plan that Gaby has crafted so painstakingly with her tired hands — shoot innocent, manipulated Flora.

Gaby reaches out, sobbing, in the manner of a woman who would rather die by the hand of the man she loves than live without him. In the manner of an agent who has done her job and done it well, she tracks Alejandro’s retracting trigger finger.

Her slippered foot has barely risen when the overshadow flinches. By the neck, Illya drags her down. One shot, two shots shatter the calm and clarity she has sacrificed for.

Face shoved to the grass behind his heels, Gaby is forced to witness the minutia of Illya’s fall in a blur of panic. He teeters back but stops himself from crushing her with a hand, a sharp grunt. Blood courses thickly from under his dark sleeve to form tributaries between his knuckles. Illya collapses on the dirt, his head striking her shoulder. She has scrambled up and not known it. Has already taken off her silk wrap to press against the hot, wet wound in his bicep.

Her mark is sprawled out feet away, heavy and lifeless. The carnations are ruined.

Between ragged breaths, Illya is speaking to her. In her head, all she hears is: ‘It’s going to be okay,’ and, ‘I trust you.’ Wide-eyed whispered sincerity; she is learning how he lies.

Illya winds his arm around her head for elevation. Lashes fluttering against her dampened cheek, he keeps himself awake soothing the trembling nape of her neck until it is matted with blood so vital to her, so needlessly shed.

MAJORCA, 28 MARCH 1964

The wound is healing well. Gaby informs Illya of this in the clipped bedside manner she has adopted over the past week. Her hands, spreading salve around his corded bicep, are gentler than her tongue. The pallor of the hospital bed has not left skin stretched translucent over fragile veins. Her fingertips trace over them before she turns to fetch the towel she has warming in the sink.

Her name is soft on his tongue, has been so even when she seethed in silence, stomped away. No apologies have been exchanged, but he must know his softness is softening her. She pauses.

Illya draws his knees closed, trapping her hips. “We can’t go on this way,” he murmurs, and he’s right.

She finds the veins along his inner arm again. Compulsive, this new touch. “He was my mark. You understand?” She leans close for the apology, forgiveness eager on her tongue.

Illya nods, solemn. “I understand you feel responsible.” His broad hands settle on her waist. “But I am fine. You must not blame yourself.”

Shock stiffens her muscles. Her sudden resistance to his gentle pull stops Illya short. The lightning heat of her glare melts the beatific look right off his face. Replacing it is confusion and a dawning realization that he needs to tread very, very carefully.

“Blame — ” Gaby’s throat works, strangling the words. “Myself? I must not blame myself?”

Ringing silence meets her words. Illya’s fingers flex against her sides. Bravery or foolishness to hang onto a live wire? Gaby lets him cook.

He searches her face, eyes eventually falling from hers. “You have been angry with me,” he admits.

What self-flattering lies has he been telling himself? That her temper was born of guilt? Throwing up her hands, she snarls, “Well done, Mr. Intelligence Expert. Why did I think for a second you would understand? God knows it would take more than a bullet to force the Red Peril to question his methods.”

That sparks his anger, makes his spine straighten so, even seated, he is taller than she is. “Assassination was always the Plan B. I do not regret killing the mark — ”

“Plan A would have gotten us his partner — ”

Illya’s voice rises above hers: “I do not regret taking his bullet for you.”

Gaby twists toward Illya’s bad arm in a bid to get away from this pointless, insulting discussion. But even injured he is capable of forcing her choices. She shoves against the vice grip around her waist, not as fiercely as she could, too aware of his winces.

She puts her strength in her voice. “My life was not in danger. I did my job.”

“Da,” he agrees readily.

“My mark would not have shot me.”

“No.”

Her hand works in the air in front of his neck, one more syllable away from throttling him. “Then why — ”

“Because continuing the job was needless. Plan B was sufficient for mission objective and you more than proved yourself.”

Warily eyeing both Illya and the satisfaction his acknowledgment kindled, Gaby indicates that she is willing to hear him out.

“Fooling the mark again would have meant three, four more weeks of sleeping with one eye open. For what? His partner is nothing without him. Waverly should not have asked this of you. It was unfair test.” Illya is the one burning now, the heat of his skin warming through her thin housedress.

Gaby leans her full weight against his arm, jarring him, but allowing him to draw her flush against his side. Clarity, calm. Leave it to her to let herself be compromised by a mass of contradictions in human form. 

“You know I don’t sleep,” she murmurs. The job had been tough, would have gotten tougher. How long could Flora have kept Alejandro enflamed with only chaste, blushing kisses? Gaby presses one against Illya’s closed mouth, leaving him to chase her lips when she pulls back to laugh. “I thought I was in a soap opera before.”

“What are you talking about?”

“To hell with the mission. You shot a man. You took a bullet.” Gaby traces the wound on Illya’s bicep, which really is healing well. “Because you were jealous.”

Illya huffs, red-faced and insulted; she is learning how he reveals the truth. His hand finds the nape of her neck to settle there with no sign of letting go. She will make him work for the forgiveness she has already bestowed without his knowing. Needless, perhaps. But the effort — the sentiment — won’t go unappreciated. 

**Author's Note:**

> prompt (anonymous): I was wondering if you could write an imagine where Illya gets shot for Gaby? Like, lots of angst and fluff in the end? Established!Gallya


End file.
